Thot
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Posts posted by Thot
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Just to be sure we're talking about the same thing. Does your spike weigh about 3/4 pound, is about 6-7 inches long and looks like this?
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Also found an old railroad spike that I am planning on polishing up and attaching a tb to, but we will have to see how that works.
A railroad spike for a travel bug . . . ? Hmm . .
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From what I gather about this, MOST GPS units will do the conversion if the cacher just knew how to toggle the right buttons.
Is this right?????
Yes.
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You may want to post your message in the Geocaching.com Web Site forum http://forums.Groundspeak.com/GC/index.php?showforum=8
I don't know if it will help but a slightly different cast of characters read that forum.
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As someone mentioned, magnetic may be easier if your compass is not adjustable for declination.
Assuming your compass has correction marks; if you’re in an unfamiliar location how do you know the declination so you can correct for it?
I know how to look it up on the internet, etc. I mean when you're on your own in Timbuktu.
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Thanks for the quick reply. So just to make sure the site is telling me to add the .200 to the minutes which is 36 but i add it to the seconds cause it is a decimal. Am I tracking?
There are no seconds given in 40 36.789. It means 40 degrees and 36.789 minutes.
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Just in case it wasn’t clear from the replies. True and Magnetic north have to do with compass readings. Latitudes and longitudes have nothing to do with compass readings. So, whether you set your GPSr to True or Magnetic north makes no difference whatever in finding a cache using Lat/Lon.
It does affect the bearing (and heading) reading the GPSr gives, so if you intend to use the device in combination with a compass it makes a difference. As Prime Suspect said, magnetic is easier to use with a compass. That’s because the compass points to magnetic north -- not true north. So, the answer is choose the magnetic option unless you intend to use the device in combination with maps while wandering around in the field on a hunt, or want to learn a lot of unnecessary stuff about declination from true north.
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This very simple free program (GeoCalc) will do it http://www.fizzymagic.net/Geocaching/GeoCalc/GeoCalc.html
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someone wrote "we took a stamp and inkpad and left a pen and scratch pad"
That's new information and I agree it points toward a geocacher.
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the lat/long was different on my gps then the posting. The posting was correct.
I'm sorry, but I don't understand. You've said the same thing twice but I don't know what you mean. If your GPSr doesn't give the right lat/lon how do you know the website gives the correct lat/lon??
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About all I saw missing that I consider essential is a stick. A hiking stick would be good but I don't have one. I have a 2 cm square meter stick with a hole and wrist strap in one end.
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Okay, I emailed Greenebbs and he says he left the stamp right where it was and that someone else must've taken it. Am I pretty much SOL at this point? Is there any way I can put out an APB for my stamp?
I don’t think so.. Someone should know better than I, but I think only a small percent of geocachers post to these forums regularly enough to see your message and I don't think there's any other way to send a general message.
If Geocaching is about taking things and leaving them elsewhere, it would stand to reason that it will turn up somewhere else, but I guess it could end up anywhere.A cardinal rule of geocaching is you must sign the log. Greenebbs signed your log, but didn’t take the stamp. This suggests to me it wasn’t a geocachers who took your stamp.
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I'm a bit confused about the way you enter the waypoints from the cache pages
ie
N 51° 48.569 W 000° 03.154
I only have space to enter 51° 48.56 and 000° 03.15 I don't have the space to enter the last digit of the co-ordinates... but still managed to find the locations ok.
Any advice on this please?
Some GPS gadgets let you change the resolution from two to three decimal places.
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When I check download all waypoints, I can only save in *.loc format. How do I save in *.pgx Format ? Is there something I am missing?
Thanks
I'm not sure why you want them in gpx format, but you can always load them into EasyGPS after downloading and save them out in gpx format. Then of course there's always gpsbabel
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Just curious, has this question ever come up before?
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I think Leatherman has it right. It's up to each cacher as to how to play the game, whether to ask, and whether (as well as how) to answer. It's not my business how or whether someone else finds a cache.
I’m not saying this should be an overriding factor, but the practice can affect others. If it becomes routine for local groups who know each other to ask where caches are that they wouldn’t have found otherwise, other players (including the owner), maybe players from out of the area, don’t get a feel for how hard it is to find. For example, if I see a lot of DNFs I often skip them if I'm caching along a traveling route where I don't have a lot of time to spend looking.
Also, some people are into competing for numbers (finds). Passing the location around among groups who know each other distorts this aspect of the game.
I’m not arguing for these positions, I’m just pointing them out because they came to mind when some people said telling friends the location doesn’t affect others.
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Looks like this may be one of those cased discussed a few days ago where someone asks a question then never comes back.
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I guess I was surprised this person was so forthright about saying they had to ask somebody else. The person is a longtime cacher. This made me wonder if it was considered a common or OK thing to do among cachers who know each other.
Incidentally, I have a friend who entertains two about 10 year orphaned boys every other weekend. I’m expecting to introduce her and the boy to cashing one weekend soon. I thought I’d start with a couple of caches I’ve found. I expect to let them wear themselves out trying to find them, but if they don’t I’ll give more and more explicit hints until the do -- even if it comes to telling them where they are.
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I don’t have a Garmin unit, but since no one else has jumped in I’ll give it a try.
If I understand your question you have been given a bearing from some location you know or can find. The bearing is given relative to 'true' north. Most if not all GPS units have an option/setting that lets you choose “True North” as opposed to ‘magnetic north’. You would want to select the true north setting. After that there’s more than one way to skin this cat but here’s how I would do it. Subtract 180 degrees from the 351. This gives 171. I assume your unit has a screen that gives “bearing”. Watch this screen and walk such that the bearing remains 171. If you have to walk around an obstacle (building, fence, etc.), return to the 171 reading when you get past the obstacle.
Usually these directions come with a distance too. In which case you want to find the screen that gives distance and keep checking it. When you reach the distance, with the bearing reading 171, you’re there.
There’s another way to enter a waypoint at a given distance and bearing on my unit but you may not have that, and this is probably easier to do anyway.
Or, if you know the declination (the correction for your location between true north and magnetic north) you can use a compass to follow that bearing.
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The easiest way to explain it is -- assuming you've already made your log entry, find it on the cache page. At the end of your log entry you'll find a link that says something like 'click here to add a picture'.
You can also click the 'edit log entry' link and you will find a 'upload image' link at the top right of the page you go to.
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what's wrong with maintaining a network of friends?
Woops, must have touched a nerve. I didn't mean to make you defensive. I wasn't saying there was anything wrong with asking for the location. I was asking a question. I certainly didn't intend to imply there was something nothing wrong with having friends.
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I recently saw this cache log:
"After missing this one the first time had trouble locating it today too, but after making calling to Xxxxxxx, Yyyyy & Zzzzzzz for help finally located this one."
Is it considered fair game to call others you see from the logs have found a cache and ask where it is?
I was kind of surprised to see this. I guess the reason it caught my eye is this was a tough find. I spent quite a while on it before I found it. I may have been the hardest one I’ve found (there are a couple I’ve never found). I haven’t yet met any other local cachers, but if I do would it be Kosher to call them to ask where caches are located?
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Has anyone listed letterboxes that they didn't own on this site. . . . I contacted the owner through the letterbox site. Either the email isn't working over there, or the owner is blowing me off.
I'd say you definitely should not list somebody else’s letterbox as a geocache.
I think there are several reasons not to but, number one, it’s not yours and he may not want to maintain a cache.
I think it's very possible he's blowing you off. From what I've read some (many?) letterboxers specifically oppose (refuse to) listing their letterboxes as caches. They have objections to the geocaching process that I can't recall right now.
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I started getting strange readings from the GPS when I got down to about 150 feet away the arrow would suddenly flip to a new heading and a new distance. It would say north 95ft i would take two steps and it would say west 135 ft, a few more steps and it was east 65 ft.
I realize that this way my first time usign a GPS and I dont know much about them so i hope that some of you more experienced cachers can help me out. is there a certaint way you have to hold them?
As Keystone Approver says your heading (the direction you are moving) requires you be moving so there are a number of factors that can cause it to appear to jump around. However the distance is based on your location and the location of the cache, both of which the GPSr should know. Early on I had an experience somewhat like yours but it wasn't that extreme. Jumping from 135' to 65' is more than I've seen. I can imagine this in an area with a lot of inteference that is somehow jamming the gadget, but I've never seen it. I've seen it wander, but not jump like that.
Soon after I started, blindleader & EScout suggested I find a stable benchmark near me and go to it a few times to see how the gadget behaves when you know you have accurate coordinates.
Here are EScout's comments:
"[T]here are super accurate benchmarks that are listed to one-hundred thousandths of a second. They are called adjusted (they are GPS adjusted.) This is an excellent way to test your GPSr and get confidence on its accuracy. (The stated "accuracy" on some GPSrs is really an "estimated position error." I think you may be pleasantly surprised when you go to one of these marks, like I have been when testing my GPSrs.
Datasheets are here..
Go to this website, choose your state, county, GPS sites only. Sort by Lat or Long and then choose a disk or rod (not a CORS.) Lots of these are on public streets and other easily accessible areas ( Remember, if you enter the coords of the benchmark into your GPSr, you need to round off, so you will be within about a 3 foot diameter of the mark. Simple geometry will let you find the position of your rounded coords (one thousandth of a minute is about 6 feet in latitude.)"
I think this is good advice. Lower accuracy benchmarks can be way off. I looked for benchmarks that were stability class A, if you don't find any try B. Hoping it is near you, go to it a few times so you see how things vary from time to time.
I was surprised how close my unit came to the real coordinates. A friend with an identical unit went with me once and got almost the same reading as I did.
This exercise gave me a feeling of confidence about how to use the gadget.
Then, when on a hunt you must remember the person who placed the cache may not have been careful in measuring the location.
Acronyms Again
in How do I...?
Posted
I use TFTH to be Thanks For The Hunt like brainsnat said, but I have read where others use it to mean Thanks For The Hide.